The electric Renault Kangoo BeBop Z.E. will soon be available for test drives open to the public. The electric car born in France wants to reveal to everyone what it’s made of, and it intends to put its best foot forward and show off its best attributes. First and foremost: its self-sufficiency, already at acceptable standards today, but which will improve in the future. The Kangoo BeBop Z.E. is capable of traveling 100 km with just one charge-up, but in the 18 months that separate it from its current state to its marketing, it is forseen to reach up to 160 km.

The Kangoo BeBop Z.E. will be one of the first electric models that Renault-Nissan will put into production in 2011, and it represents a first step in the project towards travel with zero emissions that the well-armoured French-Japanese coupling is starting for the upcoming years. The objective of Renault-Nissan, reaffirmed numerous times, is to conquest this new market right from the beginning.

The little all-capable French car, in particular, was planned keeping in mind three fundamental characteristics of the trademark, that is comfort, space, and safety. These three parameters, the company has affirmed, will remain constant in the advent of electric vehicles.

Renault Kangoo BeBop Z.E.

Continue reading: Renault: test drives open to the public for the new Kangoo BeBop Z.E.

Renault and Nissan have signed an agreement with Europcar to begin renting electric cars in 2010. Europe, Australia, and New Zealand will be the first to take advantage of this new service, but it is not yet clear if the rentals will be like classic car rentals, more long term rentals, or a type of car sharing system.

There are also no details about the cars; they could be the new electric series anticipated by the recent Renault BeBop Z.E., or an application of Project Better Place of Shai Agassi, which, though, would require the creation of infrastructure in a very short period of time. It could end up being that a new initiative will be created to launch the new “anti-Smart” city car of Renault, the awaited concept car for the next Frankfurt Motor Show.

Source | Automocionblog.com

Continue reading: Renault - Nissan: agreement with Europcar for electric car rentals starting in 2010

In attempts to boost the “green car” industry, the UK government has announced a two to five thousand pound incentive scheme for customers buying electric and hybrid plug-in cars. The scheme will start from 2011, when we should be seeing more options for hybrid purchases, and more eco-friendly cars on the road.

The program includes infrastructure plans for electric car networks around the UK, amounting to 20 million pounds. The combination of personal customer incentives and infrastructure development is set to make electric cars a real option for drivers.

Source | CarScoop

Continue reading: UK announces hybrid car incentive scheme

Tesla is not satisfied about producing and selling one of the most exciting sportscars of the world, the Roadster. It also wants to offer families the chance to ride in a clean vehicle, with no carbon emissions at all, besides expanding its range. This is why the company has been talking about a sedan that will be named Model S. Elon Musk, Tesla CEO, has promised to present a working prototype on March 26, but the company has given us a small hint on what the car will look like with the picture that is in this post.

There is no word on how powerful the car will be, but it is very likely to reach a lower top speed than Roadster’s in order to have a bigger range. Roadster can run up to 350 km with a full charge. Since we have mentioned it, range will be one of the great challenges for the company, once there is no combustion engine to help the car extend it, as Chevrolet Volt and Fisker Karma have. The car will count solely on its batteries electricity. And it does not help to load the car with batteries, once heavy cars are also able to run less. Let’s see how Tesla will solve this equation.

Source: Tesla via Autoblog Green

Tesla Model S

Continue reading: Tesla Model S has its first teaser image revealed

GM would have been the first company to sell an electric vehicle with extended range if Fisker had not presented the Karma in Detroit this year and if BYD had not released F3DM. Anyway, Chevrolet Volt will be in the minds of many people because it was the first car with that proposition to be presented by a major carmaker. In other words, it will probably be more affordable than any of its competitors. This is why Opel also aims to have its Volt on offer in Europe. And the name of the car in the Old World will be Ampera.

As we can see in these pictures, the car’s silhouette is exactly the same one presented by Volt, shaped by wind tunnels. Its range is also the same: 60 km only with its lithium-ion batteries. That leads us to think most of the technical specs will be the same. The combustion engine that generates electricity for Volt was said to be a turbocharged Family 0 1-litre three cylinder engine, which could lead it to run up to 1,030 km on a tank of fuel, but the new engine will be a 1.4-litre turbocharged petrol powerplant.

The engine that really moves Volt ahead is an electric engine that produces 150 bhp and 370 Nm. Top speed is 161 km/h. Volt is 4.40 m long, 1.80 m wide, 1.43 m tall and has a 2.69 m wheelbase, with a 301 l luggage compartment. Geneva will reveal how close these numbers are from Ampera.

Source | Opel

Opel Ampera

Continue reading: Opel gets its version of Chevrolet Volt, the Ampera

There is a joke running around the internet about what computers would be like if they were made by GM and what cars would be if Microsoft built them. Joke or not, the fact is both machines are getting closer every day. Now it is possible to access the internet in the dashboard of an automobile. Cars still keep an advantage: computers do not transport anyone around. But what would happen if cars were built in the “open source” way, as computer programs? Well, this is what EDAG aims to find out with Light Car - Open Source.

This amazing concept car is built with new materials. Its structure is made of ASA.TEC fibre, a basalt fibre that costs and weighs less than aluminum and carbon fibre, while is also fully recyclable and holds almost the same strength properties. The body is mostly made of glass and Makrolon, a sort of plastic that is at the same time resistant and transparent.

This transparent body allows EDAG to showcase another technology: (O)LED, or organic light-emitting diodes. They are well over this transparent body and help the car have headlights and taillights that are fully configurable. In other words, if you choose to have your headlights in the middle of the hood, that’s fine. Traditional settings are also acceptable.

Continue reading: EDAG will present "open source" car in Geneva, the Light Car

The Portuguese government has signed an agreement with Renault-Nissan, aimed at commercialising no-emission electric vehicles, destined both for the private and public markets. The objective is to create the conditions required to make electric cars economically convenient, such to attract the attention of consumers.

Three areas will be of focus: research (in collaboration with the French-Japanese group) on the local market and its demand to create a more adequate offering; studies on infrastructure and organisation of a country-wide re-charge network; and a public education campaign on reducing emissions.

Electric cars should only really hit the market about 2011, but Portugal should then see itself as a market leader for ZEV. The agreement was signed in Lisbon by Prime Minister José Sócrates and by Renault-Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn, cementing another important initiative only a few months after agreements with Shai Agassi and the Israelis on the Project Better Place.

Via | GreenCarCongress

Continue reading: Portugal: government initiative with Renault-Nissan for electric cars in 2011